Sierra, Santiago

Visitors to the Helmhaus will find the museum surrounded by sandbags, that universally recognisable feature of an emergency situation. The windows and entrances are sealed off, leav- ing only two controlled access points, while the river side bristles with barbed wire. Santiago Sierra has worked with a private security company to assess the building’s vulnerabilities and to ensure it is physically safe. What kind of threats do these protective measures evoke? ‘Imagine this building was not in Zurich, but in Syria or Iraq,’ suggests the artist. A time lapse video installation at Sierra’s satellite shows the transformation of the Helmhaus into a protected building.